Smyrna Town Council approved the date of a special election the town will need to hold as a result of Councilwoman Joanne Masten's election to mayor; Masten had one year left on the term of her at-large seat.

The winner of the special election will fill Masten's vacant at-large seat for the remainder of the term.

The election will be Tuesday, June 25 at Citizens' Hose Company on West Commerce Street; polls will be open 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Filing for the open at-large seat is officially open and closes Monday, June 3 at 4:30 p.m.

Town lawyer Barrett Edwards said due to requirements in not only the town charter but the state charter, there needs to be a 20-day notice for solicitation of candidates and a 20-day notice for the election. Therefore, the soonest council can hold the special election is June 25.

Mayor Masten asked about voter registration, stating there were quite a few residents not registered for the April 30 election.

"Voter registration will be extended," Edwards said.

Council may need to reschedule their Monday, July 1 council meeting in order to certify the winner of the June 25 election. The winner of the election can't be certified until seven days after the election; the Monday, July 1 council meeting is only six days after the election.

"You could postpone the July 1st meeting to July 2nd or wait until the July 15th meeting," Edwards said. "You don't need to decide tonight."

Police to hire another officer

Police Chief Wil Bordley told council the town is no longer taking applications for an open police officer position; the department needs to fill a position left vacant when an officer was injured off-duty last year.

Bordley said they received applications from six certified police officers; the department received a total of 74 applications.

"We will proceed first with the certified applicants," Bordley said. "If we don't pick one of them, we'll continue on to the rest of the applicants."

Lake Como will have lifeguards this summer

While talking about the applications for a new police officer, Masten asked Bordley on the status of the applications for lifeguards at Lake Como.

Bordley said the two lifeguards from last year will return this year; however, the department will do background checks on two other applicants as well. Bordley said that even with two lifeguards last year there were times residents were "swimming at their own risk" because of scheduling conflicts.

"We're trying to bring in more lifeguards to make sure we're always covered," Bordley said.

New employee introduced

Town Manager Dave Hugg took a moment during his manager's report to introduce who the town hired for the new assistant to the town manager position – Dawn K. Thompson. The position was added into this year's budget.

Page 2 of 2 - Hugg said Thompson has already been put to work on promoting town events and will soon get to other tasks the town previously wasn't staff properly to do.